| After
the death of Louis XVI in 1793, the Reign of Terror began. The
first victim was
Marie
Antoinette. She had been imprisoned with her children
after she was separated from Louis. First they took her son
Louis Charles from her (often called the lost dauphin, or Louis
XVII). He disappeared under suspicious circumstances.
Then she led off a parade of prominent and not-so-prominent
citizens to their deaths. The
guillotine, the new instrument of egalitarian justice,
was put to work. Public executions were considered educational.
Women were encouraged to sit and knit during trials and executions.
The Revolutionary Tribunal ordered the execution of 2,400
people in Paris by July 1794. Across France 30,000 people lost
their lives.
The
Terror was designed to fight the enemies of the revolution,
to prevent counter-revolution from gaining ground. Most of
the people rounded up were not aristocrats, but ordinary people.
A man (and his family) might go to the guillotine for
saying something critical of the revolutionary government.
If an informer happened to overhear, that was all the tribunal
needed. Watch Committees around the nation were encouraged
to arrest "suspected persons, ... those who, either by
their conduct or their relationships, by their remarks or
by their writing, are shown to be partisans of tyranny and
federalism and enemies of liberty" (Law
of Suspects, 1793). Civil liberties were suspended.
The Convention ordered that "if material or moral proof
exists, independently of the evidence of witnesses, the latter
will not be heard, unless this formality should appear necessary,
either to discover accomplices or for other important reasons
concerning the public interest." The promises of the
Declaration of the Rights of Man were forgotten. Terror was
the order of the day. In the words of Maximilien Robespierre,
"Softness to traitors will destroy us all."
Robespierre
was the mastermind of the Reign of Terror. He was the leader
of the Committee of Public Safety, the executive committee
of the National Convention, and the most powerful man in France. He
explained how terror would lead to the Republic of Virtue
in a speech to the National Convention:
If
the spring of popular government in time of peace is virtue,
the springs of popular government in revolution are at once
virtue and terror: virtue, without which terror is
fatal; terror, without which virtue is powerless. Terror
is nothing other than justice, prompt, severe, inflexible...It
has been said that terror is the principle of despotic government.
Does your government therefore resemble despotism? Yes,
as the sword that gleams in the hands of the heroes of liberty
resembles that with which the henchmen of tyranny are armed.
Maximilien Robespierre Speech
on the Justification of the Use of Terror
The
old maxim "the end justifies the means" describes
Robespierre's policy well.
Even
the radical Jacobins, the supporters of Robespierre, come
to feel that the Terror must be stopped. Danton rose in the
Convention calling for an end to the Terror. He was its next
victim. Fearful of Danton's reputation for eloquence, the
Convention passed a decree stating that any accused person
who insulted the court should be prohibited from speaking
in his own defense. Danton was not allowed to speak in his
own defense. Nevertheless after the trial Danton asserted
that "the people will tear my enemies to pieces within
3 months." As he was led to the guillotine he remarked
"Above all, don't forget to show my head to the people
- it's well worth having a look at." Modesty was never
one of his virtues.
When
Robespierre called for a new purge in 1794, he seemed to threaten
the other members of the Committee of Public Safety. The Jacobins
had had enough. Cambon rose in the Convention and said
"It is time to tell the whole truth. One man alone is paralyzing
the will of the Convention. And that man is Robespierre."
Others quickly rallied
to his support. Robespierre was arrested and sent to the guillotine
the next day, the last victim of the Reign of Terror.
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